Edible Louisville Issue #63:

Cover photo: Linda Kunz Bayens

“ Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” — Margaret Mead

Looking back, looking forward

By the time you are reading this, hopefully the cicada class of 2021 will be a distant memory. Brood X will not return until 2038. It makes me think: What kind of world might they find 17 years from now? After all, much has changed since their prior visit in 2004. At that time, Amazon was more or less an online yellow pages with pictures and Facebook barely existed, having just expanded from Harvard students to include those at Columbia, Stanford and Yale.

I imagine the world will have changed dramatically when these amazing insects re-emerge in 2038. Will old white men still be in charge of most things? Personally, I am hopeful that will not be the case and the awakening cicadas discover a world where intelligent stateswomen outnumber strongman politicians worldwide; where major environmental concerns have been addressed and overcome; where private ownership of weapons of mass destruction is a distant memory and children no longer need to practice active shooter drills; where wealth is not obscenely concentrated among just a few.

But I wonder.

On the food front, will farmers and ranchers produce our food, or will corporate machinery? Will most meals be prepared in home kitchens, or simply emptied from box delivered to the front door by drones after a cryptocurrency payment? Will “cheap” still be the overwhelming goal of most food production? Will we discover and admit the role of food additives in many modern diseases? What will the average temperature be in 2038? Will we have enough clean water?

Change is inevitable and the world order is in constant motion. I can only hope that the cicada class of 2038 emerges into a better world than the one they have just left. That will depend on the actions taken by us humans, starting now. Lets get going.

Steve Makela, Publisher